HP Pavilion x360 13-a012dx 13.3″ 2-in-1 Laptop with Intel i5, 1TB HDD

The HP Pavilion x360 13-a012dx offers a 13.3-inch display, which can rotate 360 degrees so the laptop can be also used as a tablet or multimedia stand or tent. The 13-a012dx has beefier specs than the cheaper and more popular 13-a010dx. It has the Intel Core i5-4210U dual-core processor, 6GB of RAM, and a 1-Terabyte hard drive, instead of the Core i3-4030U, 4GB RAM, and 500GB HDD. However, with a price tag of $700, the a012dx is $200 more expensive than the a010dx model.

It is questionable if these advantages justify the much higher price from the standpoint of the average user. The i5-4210U and i3-4030U processors are both mid-range parts. True, their benchmark results are noticeably different. The i5 has a PassMark score of around 3,600 points versus 2,800 with the i3. Both can handle daily home and office tasks with ease and the Intel HD 4400 graphics integrated in both of them provides support for modern 3D gaming on low-resolution and low-details. You won’t notice a big speed difference in these scenarios, but the i5 will show off its greater potential in more demanding tasks like high-definition multimedia creation. You won’t see any benefits of having 6GB of RAM instead of 4GB most of the time or ever if you stick to the basic tasks, so it isn’t a huge selling point. But, bigger hard drive space is always needed and the included 1-Terabyte has double the size of the average notebook HDD. To conclude, if you want to run hardware-demanding applications like Adobe Photoshop or Premiere and have large video and audio file libraries, the 13-a012dx is the way to go. Otherwise, the 13-a010dx can easily suite needs of the vast majority of users.

In general, the X360 13 series isn’t a premium-class convertible laptop. It lacks 1080p or higher display resolution, IPS for wider viewing angles than on the usual screens, or perks such as keyboard backlight. Also, for the chassis HP has used plastics instead of more expensive materials like aluminum or carbon-fiber. However, it packs all the necessary features of the modern laptops, with exception of missing DVD optical drive. There are stereo speakers, 720p-resolution web camera, three USB ports, HDMI video port, a media card reader, Wi-Fi wireless, Ethernet LAN, and Bluetooth.

The HP Pavilion x360 13-a012dx weighs four pounds. That’s an average weight for a 13.3″ laptop, but on the other hand, it’s quite heavy for a handheld tablet device.

HP hasn’t provided info on battery life for this model. The claimed battery life for the Intel i3-based model is up to 6 hours and 15 minutes, so you can expect that the a012dx has similar run time on a single charge.

On the end let’s mention some alternatives to this model. Besides the famous Lenovo Yoga, coming in a variety of configurations from the budget to luxury ones, you can also check out the Asus Q302LA-BBI5T14 with the same CPU and price, smaller HDD, and keyboard backlight. Many other convertible laptops can be found on this page.